Officer in Pursuit (32 page)

“No. What?”

“Never mind.” She poured him a cup of
cider. “So what are you going to do now?”

“Thought I’d help out here. You have
room for a god in here, right?”

“Sure. Just don’t let your cape fall
in the cider.”

From then on, she handled the money
while he ladled out the cider. No one asked for his autograph, but
plenty of women gave him once-overs, and even twice-overs. Kerry
noticed some male gazes clinging to her sequins, but pretended not
to. After years of trying not to be noticed, it was strange to
receive so much attention.

“That haunted house must really be
something,” Grey said. “Some of these people stopping in here
afterward look like they’re on the verge of pissing themselves.
Have you noticed how they look over their shoulders at anyone in a
mask?”

“Not really, but I hear the screams…
Ugh, is that a chain saw?”

The sounds from the neighboring farm
property echoed through the night, in full-swing now that it was
half past ten.

“Since I don’t work at night, I
haven’t heard any of this over the past two weeks,” she said. “I
can’t imagine what our guests thought. No wonder Benjamin hates
haunted houses.”

“Benjamin?”

“Wisteria’s owner.”

Grey nodded. “Yeah, it’s pretty
creepy. You probably can’t hear it as well from inside the house,
though.”

“I hope not.” Though she knew the
production was all in fun, every time she heard a particularly
piercing scream or the rumble of a chainsaw, a little chill raced
down her spine. There was no question about it: Wisteria’s black
tulle and sequins were as spooky as she wanted to get.

Faye came by the cider booth at a
quarter ‘till eleven, a big smile on her face. She wore a long
black dress, striped stockings and a witch’s hat. “Kerry, since
you’ve got an extra set of hands here, would you mind doing me a
favor?”

“Sure. What is it?”

“The costume contest trophies are in
the spare room we used for making decorations. Could you go grab
them for me? We’re going to start judging in fifteen
minutes.”

“No problem.”

“Just bring them up to the stage,
please.”

The stage was a temporary platform set
up near the gates, about twenty feet wide and three feet off the
ground. The fog machine beside it had been turned on, and as
tendrils of white vapor curled around its skirting, people in
costumes began to queue up.

By the time Kerry emerged from the
mansion with a box of trophies in her arms, most of the guests had
gathered by the stage. After hours of being in the center of a
crowd, this left her feeling oddly alone on Wisteria’s
lawn.

More alone than she’d ever been, she
realized as shock coursed through her. The Lady in White –
Elizabeth – was nowhere to be seen.

CHAPTER 24

What Elizabeth’s absence meant, Kerry
had no idea. The familiar apparition was there every day when she
arrived for work, without fail. It seemed strange that she’d hide
now, on Halloween of all nights.

A part of Kerry dared to hope it was a
sign that her personal dangers had finally passed, but she didn’t
really believe it. Still, it was a nice thought, and
maybe…

Maybe Brad had finally been caught by
the police. The idea dawned on her, shedding a bright ray of hope
on her suspicions. She walked to the stage with a slight spring in
her step, though she tried not to get her hopes up. After
depositing the trophies, she returned to the cider
booth.

“People have lost interest in cider,”
Grey said, nodding toward the stage. “What are the costume contest
prizes?”

“Trophies and gift cards that some
local restaurants donated, including one from Harvest at
Wisteria.”

“People seem awfully
excited.”

Kerry shrugged and took advantage of
the lull in business by finally pouring herself a cup of cider.
“It’s free food.”

“Speaking of food… You think there’s
anything good left over at Sasha’s table? I’m starving.”

Kerry cast a glance at the long table
that’d been set up buffet-style on the other side of all the games.
She had to lean out of the booth to see it, but there appeared to
be food left. “There’s definitely stuff laid out. I can’t see what
it is from here, though.”

“You hungry?”

“Yeah, now that you mention it, I am.”
She’d been too busy to notice, before. Now that he’d brought it up
though, there was definitely a hollow, pinched feeling in her
stomach.

“I’ll go grab us some plates. Anything
in particular you want?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know what’s
there for the taking, but I’m sure that if Sasha made it, it’s
good.”

“Okay.”

His cape fluttered behind him as he
made a beeline for the buffet, uninhibited by the crowd, which had
clustered around the stage. Faye was standing three feet higher
than everyone else, inviting the first round of contestants to join
her. There was applause as an extremely realistic zombie staggered
up onto stage, and an equally creepy clown followed.

Had those two escaped from their
duties at the haunted house next door to participate? Their
costumes were good, almost professional looking. And creepy beyond
belief, especially the clown.

When Grey returned to the booth and
blocked Kerry’s view of the stage, it was a mercy. “Sorry, but they
were out of everything besides cocktail shrimp and that pumpkin
cheesecake. I know it’s a weird combination, but if you’re as
hungry as I am…”

He pushed a plate piled high with
shrimp and cheesecake toward her. There was even a little pool of
cocktail sauce that was threatening to merge with the whipped
cream.

She was hungry enough not to care.
“Thanks,” she said, and tried to eat without looking like a rabid
wolf.

Grey popped shrimp into his mouth two
at a time and nodded toward the stage. “What’s the judging
criteria?”

“I think right now they’re doing
‘scariest costume’. I mean, they’ve gotta be, right?”

“Yeah, that zombie looks like he
walked off a TV set.”

“But the clown will win, don’t you
think?”

Grey shrugged. “What’s he gonna do,
stab somebody? Happens all the time. We’ve got a hundred meth heads
that look scarier than him at Riley, and plenty of them have
stabbed people. Flesh-eating, though… That’s scary as
hell.”

“I don’t know. I think I’d take my
chances with the zombie. After last week at the shooting range, I’m
pretty confident I could pull off a headshot with my Glock. They
move so slowly, they’d make great targets.”

“That’s true. But clowns are the type
of creepy bastards who’d try to get real close and personal to kill
you, but without biting. You could shoot them. Taser them. Beat
them over the head with a frying pan. So many possibilities. All
you have to do is be faster than they are.”

Kerry tried to win Grey over by
arguing that zombies weren’t and could never be real, while any
creep could potentially dress up in a clown suit. But he was
steadfast in his belief that zombies were scarier than ‘morons in
make-up and giant shoes’.

“Seriously,” he said, “the idiot would
be more likely to trip over his bozo feet and fall on his own blade
than successfully murder someone else. And good luck sneaking
around unnoticed to commit homicides when you look like
that.”

“No one looks at the shoes!” Kerry
said. “It’s all in the face. Anyone’s eyes would look dark and
beady ringed by all that make-up. And then there’s the mouth…
Something about those perma-smiles just creeps me out.”

“And yet, you pretend that the
zombie’s artfully exposed teeth aren’t scarier. Come on. You’re
kidding yourself. This is our first argument, and I
win.”

Sasha appeared in a blur of red
spandex and blonde hair. “What are you arguing about? I’ll play
tiebreaker if you need a third opinion.”

“A zombie or a killer clown – which is
scarier?” Kerry asked before Grey could say anything.

“God, do you even have to ask? The
clown, of course! Zombies aren’t real.” She narrowed her eyes in
the direction of the stage. “That clown, though… How do we know
he’s not going to walk out of here and murder someone
tonight?”

“That’s exactly what I said!” Kerry
flashed a gleeful smile at Grey, who just shook his head, his cape
swishing.

“Oh, Grey…” Sasha said. “If you’re not
creeped out by that clown, I’m worried about you. A man in your
line of work should be able to identify a threat when he sees it.”
She jabbed a finger toward the stage. “Right now, we’re basically
being bitten in our collective ass by one.”

He just snorted and took a drink from
what was maybe his sixth cup of cider.

“I’ll be right back,” Kerry said,
feeling the effects of the one she’d finished just minutes ago.
“I’m just going to run to the restroom.”

“Hurry up,” Sasha said. “They’re about
to announce the winner of the scariest costume category. I want you
to see Grey’s face when he loses.”

By the time Grey retorted, Kerry was
already out of the booth and heading for the house. In nothing but
her mermaid costume, she was a little chilly. It was probably about
sixty degrees out, and her bare arms and shoulders pebbled as she
climbed the stairs.

Inside the house, it was perfectly
warm. She hurried to the restroom and back out, but was forced to
take the steps slowly – one wrong move, and she’d trip over her
flowy mermaid tail.

By the time her shoes hit the lawn,
she could hear the faint roar of a chainsaw drifting from the
neighboring property again. It made her break out in a fresh crop
of goose bumps, and she had a sudden vision of the clown on stage
wielding a chainsaw.

Now
that
would be scary.

Of course, like Grey had said, the
clown’s oversized shoes might make such a weapon an unwise choice.
The thought had her smiling despite the creepiness of it all. Only
Grey could find something funny about a psychotic clown.

The house was just behind her when she
saw a flash of movement in her peripheral vision. She’d just begun
to turn towards it when something closed hard around her upper arm
and a hand clapped down over her mouth.

Her panic was instant and
overwhelming, almost debilitating. She writhed and fought, but
without any real direction. She was like a fish out of water, and
her mouth already tasted of pennies – the coppery flavor of
adrenaline.

Thoughts of clowns and chainsaws were
gone now, replaced by a much more real and potent fear: a fear of
Brad. The person pulling her into the shadows beside the house was
a man – she could tell by his size, his strength, and the guttural
curse that rolled out of him when she managed to land an elbow in
his ribs.

She couldn’t be sure, but the rumble
of his voice seemed familiar. He wore a mask – it was black and
faceless, a wraith’s hood. He wore gloves too, was dressed from
head to toe in black. On any other night, he would’ve looked like a
criminal. Tonight, he could’ve been anyone out of the Halloween
crowd.

Her attempts to scream – to make any
noise loud enough to draw attention – were futile. She could taste
blood from where he was mashing her lips against her teeth,
bruising her cheeks with his fingertips. No matter how hard she
kicked and swung her elbows, he didn’t cry out.

There were woods behind the house,
beyond the back lawn. She realized now that he’d grabbed her
strategically, at the place closest to the tree line. As he pulled
her toward it, her heart beat so fast she feared it might
burst.

It didn’t, though. It kept going –
kept pounding – as they disappeared into the shadows cast by
two-hundred year old pines. Underbrush crunched beneath her sandals
as she scrambled for a foothold, getting tangled in her mesh tail
fins. The crowd across the lawn was so close.

And yet, so far away. Kerry twisted
and lashed out with her fists and elbows, her movements frantic.
But Brad’s hands – they had to be his – were like vises on her arm
and mouth. She was almost afraid that if she jerked too hard, she’d
snap her neck.

She didn’t let that stop her, because
anything would be better than whatever he had planned for her. It
was like what they always said about being abducted: if you got in
the vehicle, you were as good as dead. Fighting tooth and nail to
stay out of a vehicle was always the safest choice, even if it
meant gambling with your life.

There was no car in this situation,
but the gist of the advice was the same. Which made it that much
more terrifying when Kerry kept failing to escape, to overpower the
man in the mask.

A dozen regrets ran through her mind.
Why had she gone anywhere alone? Why hadn’t she carried a weapon of
some sort? A knife, pepper spray… Anything.

The house faded behind a screen of
tree trunks, and all the breath was knocked out of her lungs when
her captor slammed her hard against an oak, pinning her with her
back against its bark.